Form, Function, & Phenotypes

Ted Sallis’s recent article “Anders Breivik & Genetic vs. Phenotypic Interests” is internally consistent, but his focus on the genetic patterns that are the blueprint of Whiteness causes him to miss the forest for the trees. While his line of genetic research is good science, it’s incomplete science which is not yet prepared to inform our politics. It lacks altogether a deeper appreciation of the nature of what those alleles actually represent.

By moving prematurely from theory to practice, Sallis arrives at prescriptions that are at best incomplete and at worst counter-productive. In many ways, the past decade has been a lost one for our cause due to its inappropriate emphasis on arguments and strategies drawn from biological research. It’s self-evidently obvious that nobody’s going to be compelled to die in battle for his “ethnic genetic interests,” at least not explicitly so. This is perhaps fortunate, given that such a campaign wouldn’t accomplish the presumed objective.

Preservation in the conventional sense is futile, even if we Whites were to colonize Mars. In the final analysis, form is a reflection of function, and the White race has been in a steady decline since the selective factors which generated Whiteness subsided. Is our goal to preserve the blond phenotype? Why? Why was it selected in the first place? What good are strong jaws, blue eyes, dolicocephalic craniums, or delicate ivory skin that bubbles up and peels off when exposed to sunlight? Is Whiteness defined as a collection of visible and invisible traits that can be quantified through genetic analysis, or is Whiteness a holistic effect of adaptation to a specific challenge?

The line drawn at the Strait of Bosphorus is a purely political line and shouldn’t be confused for an anthropological one. It’s smart to draw the line there for historical, geographical, political, religious, and cultural reasons. But there are plenty of specimens on the Asiatic side of the strait whose genotype and phenotype are essentially White, and there are plenty of specimens on the European side of the strait whose genotype and phenotype are generally incommensurate with any attempt to arrive at a common definition of what it means to be White. The squishy reality is that the genetic difference between White Europeans and Asiatic Caucasians is more clinal than cladistic. The conventional boundaries of “Europe” are an excellent place to draw that line, though we shouldn’t pretend that the men and women with freckles and cleft chins who land on the wrong side of it are genetically alien in any meaningful way.

Setting aside the genetic threat of blue-eyed crypto-Turks, differential breeding patterns within the race are rapidly transforming it. While there’s little selection for appearance and health, selection for behavioral patterns and cognitive abilities carries on apace. As we speak, the higher classes of Whites are gradually drifting on to become managerial elites in not only function but in form. They’re becoming less creative, less impulsive, less courageous, and less socially alpha. In summary, they’re being selected to excel in a mature civilization rather than in a nomadic warrior tribe . . . a process which has already occurred among Jews, Mandarins, and Brahmins. Would a purely “White” population which has radically transformed itself through resorting within its gene pool continue to be “White” as we know it, despite being completely different?

Defining ourselves as a kinship group isn’t the goal. It’s merely a precondition. Stopping the flood of non-Whites isn’t promoting Whiteness. It’s merely shooing away the vultures picking at our exposed viscera. We’ll eventually die off one way or another whether the vultures and hyenas have their shot at our carcass or not. To survive, we must discover a way to re-create or simulate the selective conditions which created Whiteness in the first place. It’s not about identifying some alleles and preserving them. Even if this quixotic project were completely successful, it would only succeed at arresting our potential for further progress.

One of the most serious obstacles to a purely biological formulation of the doctrine of race is the fact that cross-breeding and contamination of the blood are not the only cause of the decline and decay of races. Races may equally degenerate and come to their end because of a process – so to speak – of inner extinction, without the participation of external factors. . . .

When a race has been reduced to a mere ensemble of atavistic automatisms, which have become the sole surviving vestiges of what once it was, then a collision, a lesion, a simple action from outside, is enough to make it fall, to disfigure it and to denature it. In such a case, it does not behave like an elastic body, ready to react and to resume its original shape after the collision (provided, that is, that the latter does not exceed certain limits and does not produce permanent actual damage), but, rather, it behaves like a rigid, inelastic body, which passively endures the imprint of external action.

This means, essentially, ‘to exalt’ its inner race; to see to it that its intimate tension is never lacking; that, as counterpart of its physical integrity, within it there is something like an uncontrollable and irreducible fire, always yearning for new material to feed its blaze, in the form of new obstacles, which defy it and force it to reassert itself.

What Evola is conveying here is that Whiteness is as Whiteness does. Biological reductionism focuses on the weapon while losing sight of its role in the war. We have only three alternatives to extinction: succeeding in the current habitat (becoming Jews); reviving or simulating the habitat which causes Whiteness; or pursuing an entirely new form and function, as suggested in Greg Johnson’s notorious essay “Is Racial Purism Decadent?” While a recommendation that we seal off the borders and defend our kin is good advice, it’s ultimately precluded by the fact that Whites in their currently dysfunctional and decadent form would be incapable of acting on the advice even if they found it persuasive.

Until we Whites can overcome the inner extinction Evola speaks of, this outer extinction will continue to carry on unabated. Until we can rekindle that blaze which originally propelled us and can find the material to feed that blaze, then we’ll continue to die off. If we expect to actually reverse the decline in the frequency of the alleles which are unique to our population, then we’ll have to look beyond alleles and towards the traditions and transcendent ideals which were once the function animating our biological form.

53 Comments

I want to defend Matt, and myself by implication, from teh charge that we privilege the Jimmy Stewart types over the John Waynes.

We play the role of Jimmy Stewart (verbal discipline, no tough talk) because we want to create a discourse atmosphere where we do not get arrested for making death threats, and we draw a bright line between us and the Hal Turner/Bill White crowd. If we didn’t do that, we’d have peopel doing tough talk on our blogs and forums even if we didn’t do it ourselves.

Does lack of “tough talk” mean that we are prissy wussified pacifists? I guess that’s something that will be left unsaid, but I’ll offer this one hint — don’t count on it. We do not allow ourselves to “blow off steam” and instead recycle our rage into what Muslims would call “jihad” (spiritual war).

One thing verbal discipline taught me to do was to say things, in arguing with antis, like, “It hurts me very much to see white women and their bloodlines destroyed by miscegenation. It wrenches my heart in two. And for now, there’s nothing I can do about it. It is destroying my health, and I imagine this is happening to a lot of White men like me. I control it well, but I imagine there’s White men out there who don’t have the self control that I have.” That sort of language where I admit to vulnerability and impotent, controlled rage and heartbreak instead making threats and venting rage. Let them attack,let them make Freudian jokes or something.

I try on different things because the above approach might actually garner sympathy from the white fence-sitting audience. Try different approaches until something works. What won’t work right now is John Wayne. That is one approach out of many possible approaches. If the time comes that we need to be John Wayne, I think both myself and Matt and many others in the middle class movement will prove to have the mettle.

Help us understand the significance of genotype, as opposed to phenotype.

To date, you have written that genotype determines kin, and in response to my earlier comment you indicated that both appearance and behavior are phenotypic outcomes.

But to say that genotype determines kin is to say that genotype determines genotype – the word ‘kin’ is derived from Old English cyn, Old High German kunni, and is equivalent to Latin genus. This is an equivocation not an explanation.

So if appearance, behavior, and values are a product of phenotype, what practical value is there in the perpetuation of a genotype via a phenotypic person that (for example) is ugly, rude and only cares about sport and snacks, even if she is your kin/gene? What does genotype determine?

I can understand why some people are willing to jettison even members of their own family if they are beyond rectification. People are a plastic material – a potter does not continue wasting his energies on a bad batch of clay if he can find one more amenable to his influence.

No. Asserting that this essay is somehow a response to the Breivik piece is fundamentally dishonest, and further asserting that that piece was making “counter-productive prescriptions” is even more dishonest. Again for the challenged: the Breivik piece made no prescriptions at all, and stating that a particular course of action is adaptive is a simple statement of evolutionary biology.

Let’s look at what Parrott wrote and then go back and reread the Breivik piece:By moving prematurely from theory to practice, Sallis arrives at prescriptions that are at best incomplete and at worst counter-productive. In many ways, the past decade has been a lost one for our cause due to its inappropriate emphasis on arguments and strategies drawn from biological research.

Incredible. That’s the ticket! Salter and MacDonald and all those “sciency” guys lost our decade. Parrott with his fedora will save us!

In general, yes, with this generalization getting weaker and weaker with each successive generation as relatedness doesn’t account for inner extinction at all and the complete absence of miscegenation is unavoidable. That’s putting it mildly, as the reality is that a large subset of Whites have fractional Black, Amerindian, Jewish, Semitic, Turkic, Lapp, and gypsy admixture.

It’s the difference between the splintered pursuit of hundreds of millions of racial ideals and the pursuit of a unified ideal which transcends our current form.

I haven’t the slightest idea of your point here. Better – I don’t want to know.

Why your children? Why not some stranger’s children who better reflect the ideal forms you admire? Indeed, if you are not a hypocrite, you’d sacrifice the lives of your own children so as to better support others who exemplify your ideal.

I have been following this discussion with great interest. Although Parrott has many good points, this comment shows why he is wrong on the matter of phenotype versus genotype: we care about the survival of our race because it is our race, not because it looks like our race. We want our blood relatives to survive, not just people who look like us.

But I think that Parrott is right that we need a survival strategy that involves something more than EGI, but that strategy must nontheless include EGI – or else it would be self refuting: it would kill the things trying to survive, replacing them with something that mimmicks their looks. Thus it would be a bad survival strategy.

Why would you even want such survival, Parrott? Why do you in that case care for a race that would not be your own, but looks like it (if we stretch this argument to its limits)? Just esthetics?

The base instinct for perpetuating your own kind is a good and necessary instinct to exploit in pursuit of our goal. But we can’t confuse it with the goal, which is the promotion of the set of aesthetic and behavioral inclinations which create high culture, win wars, inspire wars with their beauty, and fuel innovation.

First – racial preservation is a “base instinct?” Incredible. Second, why are the two things deemed incompatible? We should preserve Europeans and improve the stock by reasonable means. Genepools change from generation to generation, even in the absence of migration or even selection, by virtue of genetic drift. Change in inevitable. But the change can preserve basic genetic interests by eschewing alien mass migration, intermarriage across wide racial lines, and so forth. If change is inevitable, there’s nothing to say we cannot direct that change, gradually over time, without damaging the genetic interests of any generation.

I theoretically approve of my people being genetically replaced if the replacements are nearer the ideal of form and function than my own

Whose ideal? The HBD cognitive elitists ideal is a high-IQ Chinaman. They think the Chinaman should replace you. Why are your ideals right and their ideals wrong?

It’s different values. I value adaptive behavior. Those who do not value adaptive behavior end up being replaced by those who do.

But Parrott is alright with that. Guess what? When you quibble about defending your people because they are your people, and they represent an inherent interest to you, others, including all those clannish “white” Turks and Kalash, will relentlessly pursue their ethnic interests, unrestrained by your fantasies about “ideal forms.” The world will belong to those willing to survive, not to those willing to let themselves be replaced.

The world will belong to those willing to survive, not to those willing to let themselves be replaced.

The world belongs to those who not only have the will to survive but also have the right survival strategy. We have no better odds of defeating our competitors by growing sharper elbows in a mature civilization than we have of defeating ticks by sucking their blood. We’re integrally maladapted to this habitat and must radically change the habitat to one which selects for our traits.

I have no more allegiance to the set of instructions which produced me than I have to the water and minerals which comprise my physical form. I’m the manifestation of an abstract form designed for excelling at a function. You keep pretending that genetic interests are too complex for the rest of us to understand, as if you had access to some esoteric science beyond our grasp. You believe it’s about preserving the code, when the preservation of the code is merely a means to an end.

It’s the rediscovery and renewed pursuit of that end which is integral, not the taxidermist’s preservation of the code which was utilized long ago towards the pursuit of that end. What you’re promoting is as absurd as cargo cultists reconstructing the form of airplanes and landing strips without an understanding of their function. Our genetic code is merely cargo to you, and is a useless ceremonial bauble without a more complete understanding of its function.

I think the best way to get into this issue is the following scenario. Say that you have a choice to marry two women. Both of them are pretty much the same phenotypically: in age, health, temperament, looks, etc. One of them is a local girl, very close genetically, perhaps even a distant cousin. The other is an immigrant from Belarus.

If ethnic genetic interests were the primary concern, then most other things being equal, one would choose the local girl. Genetically speaking, one has more in common with her and thus would have more in common with one’s children than if one mated with the girl from Belarus.

But what if the girl from Belarus shared certain values and convictions that were highly unusual, including the belief that our race has a glorious destiny to fulfill and an aesthetic ideal towards which we might wish to evolve. These ideals are certainly not based on facts. They might be quite irrational in origin. They could even be a compound of esoteric Hitlerism and Tolkien, a la Farnham O’Reilly’s novel Hyperborean Home. (See my review here: http://www.counter-currents.com/2011/07/hyperborean-home/.)

The children of that union might be more genetically distant than the children one might have with the local girl. But on the other hand, in terms of values, one would be closer to them, since they would be children conceived in the light of common ideals concerning our race’s destiny.

Now, obviously that ideal requires that one be of the same race. One couldn’t achieve the same aims with a Japanese girl who holds the same beliefs.

The issue, as I see it, is the relative weight we give to genetic conservatism versus genetic progressivism.

I suspect; however, that you would rather quibble over my inaccurate assumptions and dismiss the core of my argument in favor of framing yourself as a victim of some sort of personal vendetta. The pattern isn’t one of me attacking you but rather one of me attempting to express a disagreement and you making it personal.

I disagreed with some comments made by Greg. I wrote an essay in which I quoted the specific comments and explained why I disagreed with the specific comments. Further, as a “professional courtesy” I let Greg know weeks in advance that I was planning to submit an essay critiquing comments he made concerning Breivik and genetic interests.

Parrott on the other hand does not cite any specific passages, as he accuses me of “counter-productive prescriptions.” In fact, his essay is not really at all in response to the Breivik piece, but a belated reply to my racial cuckoldry articles, and related to his attack on Salter at Occidental Dissent that he took down after a day.

That’s why there is a disconnect between the two Counter-Currents essays, and why Greg Johnson notes that Parrott and I seem to be “talking past each other” – since I am actually in agreement with many of the “prescriptions” that Parrott accuses me of being against.

I disagreed with some comments made by Greg. I wrote an essay in which I quoted the specific comments and explained why I disagreed with the specific comments.

Your condescending and intemperate response to my attempt to politely disagree with you then is the same as your condescending and intemperate response to my attempt to politely disagree with you now. My alternative perspective is that we’re forms with a martial function selected for a bygone habitat and that discussion of preserving our genetic interests misses the entire point of being White.

Your essay seemed like a good jumping off point for offering my own perspective on the matter, but you’re interpreting it as an angry unprovoked attack. Future attempts to offer my perspective will be made without mentioning you or your work, as I’ve obviously personally offended you.

If the fact of genotype had high objective value as a determinant of behavior

Of course you agree with Matt. You haven’t the slightest idea of that genetic interests are. It’s about kinship, not a ranking of phenotypic traits, such as behavior, which is more Parrott’s interests,

Biological racists need to understand that the dynamic of absorption, through which one race comes to dominate another, does not rest at the biological level, nor even at the cultural; both of these manifestations are an outcome of a process that takes place on a higher plane, the ‘soul of peoples’, if you like.

When men fail to understand this, they all too easily fall for the illusory allure of the hard facts of science. Yet we must not exaggerate the value of facts. If the fact of genotype had high objective value as a determinant of behavior, we would not bear witness to millions of genotypical Europeans doing what they do today. If genotype is subordinate to so many other corrupting influences beyond the biological, what value does it have as an objective characteristic?

Indeed, men who are seduced by science approach the issue of Western preservation with all the zeal of a zookeeper, fussing over minutiae as though they were hypnotized. Nothing less is to be expected from one who has lost sight of true principle.

“I agree with Matt. Biological racists need to understand that the dynamic of absorption, through which one race comes to dominate another, does not rest at the biological level, nor even at the cultural; both of these manifestations are an outcome of a process that takes place on a higher plane, the ‘soul of peoples’, if you like.”

Absolutely. That’s why it’s worth rereading Pierce’s metaphysical article, as featured here. Why for example do you want the purest Nordic genotype if the Swedes are the most treasonous people against their race? Forget genes for the moment. Something horribly wrong must have happened in the white psyche: a monster from the Id that is destroying their civilization.

I still believe that all of this is a discusión bizantina (see above) and that in this age of treason we should focus in the software (how did the monster from the Id originate), not in the hardware of whites (genes).

Biological reductionism focuses on the weapon while losing sight of its role in the war

So, if preserving the biological race is not the ultimate objective what is? Culture? What? “Whiteness?” Does “Whiteness” have a biological basis? If so, it’s genetic. If not, then this is pure race denial.

Further, to accuse a long-time supporter of Yockey of “biological reductionism” is laughable. We need BOTH the materialist biology as well as the High Culture and the more non-biological aspects of identity.

I challenge anyone to point out where I’ve ever stated that these other concerns are not important. Indeed, I see the value of an accurate accounting of EGI to be the foundation, the initial first step – not the final word.

In other words, once we know the EGI facts, and the costs/benefits to fitness of varied alternative objectives, we can then decide upon a course of action.

Caring about genes as one component of identity is not “reductionism.” Yes, genetic interests are “ultimate” interests, since existence precedes all else. But mere existence in and of itself, is not the only objective. It is the precondition for racial and civilizational progress. But that progress needs to be followed by the light of knowledge, not in the darkness of ignorance.

Again: know the facts, then decide what to do with them. That’s not “reductionism” – merely good sense.

So, if preserving the biological race is not the ultimate objective what is? Culture? What? “Whiteness?” Does “Whiteness” have a biological basis? If so, it’s genetic. If not, then this is pure race denial.

Whiteness has a critical biological component, but only as a means towards an end of approaching perfection of the warrior ideal. Among semi-nomadic warrior tribes, the most successful tribes and the most successful warlords within those tribes not only managed to survive at the expense of the men they defeated—they took the most attractive women from the gender imbalance for their harems. With each successive iteration of this process, the population grew more intelligent, more creative, more alpha and aggressive in disposition, and more feminized and fair in appearance.

That is Whiteness, and it’s a design pattern which transcends its specific implementation.

In its place, you propose “eugenics” while having no idea what you’re even selecting for. Merely selecting for intelligence or success in the contemporary context will not select for the nature of intelligence and the behavioral inclinations which result in White societies.

And what are you selecting for? And how do you know what I propose to select for? I didn’t state “intelligence or success in the contemporary context” – I merely invoked eugenics (change and improvement) as an example of how Salter’s theory is consistent with change and does not imply stasis. After all, Parrott wrote:

Even if this quixotic project were completely successful, it would only succeed at arresting our potential for further progress.

What kind of progress does he have in mind? Examples? How does this differ from a general embrace of eugenic principles – the specifics of which remain to be determined?

Parrott, fueled by personal animus, puts words in my mouth and then argues against a strawman.

Sallis arrives at prescriptions that are at best incomplete and at worst counter-productive.

And what prescriptions are these? There were no “prescriptions” in my latest piece

Parrott critiques “prescriptions” when there were no “prescriptions” at all in the article. In fact, the article openly stated that one could pursue phenotypic interests if they so wished, as long as they understand that these are not necessarily equivalent to genetic interests, and that favoring non-kin over kin for this reason is not adaptive.

This is why I can’t help thinking that my essay here triggered some sort of “allergic” reaction based on what happened at MacDonald’s site, and why Parrott feels obligated to write an entire essay accusing me of taking positions that I have never taken and, indeed, if one reads some of my TOQ articles recently, actually argue against.

In fact, the article openly stated that one could pursue phenotypic interests if they so wished, as long as they understand that these are not necessarily equivalent to genetic interests, and that favoring non-kin over kin for this reason is not adaptive.

Stating that a behavior is not adaptive comes close enough to prescribing behavior that I jumped to an inaccurate conclusion. You’ve clarified the points where I’ve jumped to inaccurate conclusions and I’ll gladly append the article to account for that if you feel that your corrections and my concessions in the comments are insufficient.

I suspect; however, that you would rather quibble over my inaccurate assumptions and dismiss the core of my argument in favor of framing yourself as a victim of some sort of personal vendetta. The pattern isn’t one of me attacking you but rather one of me attempting to express a disagreement and you making it personal.

People did not need modern racial science or modern genetics to know that there are racial differences, that inter-racial mating produced hybrids, etc. So, again, just how foundational in modern race science to what White Nationalists really want?

Sure, modern science is not absolutely essential to racial nationalism. But it helps.

All I say is: know the information. What you decide to do with it is another matter. My Breivik essay was not prescriptive. I was clarifying points. If you want to accept Turks and Kalash based on phenotype – be my guest. But you should know what you are doing. The science allows you to better understand the relative costs/benefits to different decisions.

Ultimately though, the decisions must be based on values. Salter is careful not to commit the “naturalistic” or “is/ought” fallacies. The existence of genetic differences and genetic interests does not obligate anyone to pursue them. One needs to value adaptive fitness. If one values some other objective, so be it.

But they should be informed enough to know the difference. I don’t object so much to people saying “for political reasons, the Kalash are white” than people saying “since a single photo of a couple of Kalash children look European to my eyes, then they are white.”

Goals = facts + values. Everyone has their sets of values. Given the facts, insofar as we can know them, they can set goals.

The Old European, Mediterranean/Semitic, Aryan, and Finno-Ugric populations comprising Europe may not be as related as they appear.

Assuming that these names actually correlate to actual biological entities, the relationship between them can, and is, be established through analysis.

Further, I think that Parrott misses the point about my essay here as well as the racial cuckoldry pieces. You know, if you want to accept Kalash as “white” – you have that option. Maybe there’s some net gain in doing do. My point is – know all the information before making the decision. You should know exactly what the costs are to EGI. If you still think the benefits outweigh the costs – fine. But to dismiss genes as unimportant – that’s what I argue against.

Once you ignore actual kinship, you open the door to genetic replacement.

Once you ignore actual kinship, you open the door to genetic replacement.

Once you ignore the racial ideal, you close the door on progressing beyond our current form. My ideal for my children is that they be an improvement upon me, that their prospects by brighter than mine. You apparently concede that relatedness can take a back seat to an ideal when you promote eugenics, so I don’t want to beat a dead horse.

And, yes. I theoretically approve of my people being genetically replaced if the replacements are nearer the ideal of form and function than my own. I would probably fight back as a way of making them earn it and in an effort to protect my immediate and extended family from harm. I seek to make this point mute by being the progress rather than standing in the way of progress.

then does it matter if nature took a slightly different pathway to arrive at someone who is phenotypically and behaviorally and functionally the same?

Does it matter? It sure does, just as it matters to a parent who their child actually is, based on “blood” relations. Or does Parrott believe that paternity determination should be based on “that kid sure looks like him, by golly” rather than by the actual gene analysis that is done – analysis performed to ascertain actual kin relations?

Further, if you are concerned with “function” – then peoples who are similar genetically in addition to by appearance, are more likely to share behavioral/functional traits than are those who look alike but are genetically different.

Two Frenchmen are more likely to share genes influencing behavior, etc than is a Frenchman and a Kalash, even if the Kalash looks remarkably like the Frenchman. Of course, on an individual level, there can be outliers. But, in general, the principle holds. Even if you were more concerned with overall “function” rather than kinship, you’d have a better chance of matching function through ethnic kinship rather than “that there Kalash seems to look mighty white to me.”

Further, if you are concerned with “function” – then peoples who are similar genetically in addition to by appearance, are more likely to share behavioral/functional traits than are those who look alike but are genetically different.

Valuing relatedness to self over relatedness to the racial ideal doesn’t work in the aggregate or in the long term.

Even if you were more concerned with overall “function” rather than kinship, you’d have a better chance of matching function through ethnic kinship rather than “that there Kalash seems to look mighty white to me.”

In general, yes, with this generalization getting weaker and weaker with each successive generation as relatedness doesn’t account for inner extinction at all and the complete absence of miscegenation is unavoidable. That’s putting it mildly, as the reality is that a large subset of Whites have fractional Black, Amerindian, Jewish, Semitic, Turkic, Lapp, and gypsy admixture.

It’s the difference between the splintered pursuit of hundreds of millions of racial ideals and the pursuit of a unified ideal which transcends our current form.

This discussion here of the relative merit of genes and simple relatedness is a valuable one that can benefit from further analysis. It’s not personal for me this time and it wasn’t personal for me last time. I want to have a discussion about form, function, and phenotypes. If you feel put-upon by the attention then I’ll gladly step back, re-frame, and make my argument in a manner that doesn’t address you.

Let me get the other points out of the way quickly. First, the science has already spoken on the Kalash – they are South/Central Asian. It’s possible that future findings may alter their position on the genetic spectrum; however, given the relative association between geographic distance and genetic distance – the “clines” that Parrott himself reflexively cites (similar to “anti-racist” argumentation against race, by the way) – it would seem certain that groups found in Central/South Asia will continue to be associated with those peoples. It’s unlikely current findings will change that much. We are already at the point where people can determine genetic kinship/gene sharing through individualized analysis (although we need genetic structure analysis to finish the story, but that’s another point).

Second, I never said reproducing the conditions creating “Whiteness” was “laughable.” I did imply that it was more “quixotic” than following Salter’s prescriptions as outlined in his book.

Now to the major point:The difference between genotype and phenotype is a distinction without a difference. If an individual looks and acts White, then he’s White, regardless of how his genome arrived at that effect.

I cannot disagree more. I actually cannot understand how anyone can hold such a position. Take it to its logical conclusion. John and Mark are full brothers and are walking down the street. They meet a friend – a completely unrelated stranger – named Charles. They all notice that Charles and John look a lot more alike than does John and Mark. Is the actual kin relation between John and Mark less important than the surface resemblance between John and Charles?

Some people will try and say “its the emotional ties between brothers that are important.” This fails two way. First, I’m not only talking about actual behavior (what would a person actually do in the situation), but here I AM being “prescriptive” – I’m asking what should they do to behave adaptively. All else being equal, does John favor Mark over Charles? Or the opposite?

Second, if you want to consider actual behavior, change the scenario. John meets for the first time Mark and Charles. He notes that Charles is so similar in appearance they could be twins. But it’s Mark, based on gene analysis, who proves to be his long-lost, full brother. Which is kin? Which is family? To which does John have the stronger connection to?

If it doesn’t matter how the phenotype is arrived at, why not accept plastic surgery (or human-like robots for that matter)? Oh – Parrott would argue that, OK, he cares about heritable aspects of whiteness. That implies genes. So Parrott cares only about a fraction of the genome that codes for physical appearance, and discounts all the rest. Why?

Why are some genes so important that our whole political stance is based on them, but all the rest are ignored?

Why not consider ALL distinctive genes? Certainly, some are more important than others. Genes that influence their own replication could, in theory, be considered of higher value than others that merely carry information on kinship relations (important in and of itself I think). However, how can you sit back and decide that one set of genes are privileged over all, and all the rest are meaningless?

If we then decide that we need to consider all the genome, then we get back to EGI, and reject Parrott’s ideas.

Second, I never said reproducing the conditions creating “Whiteness” was “laughable.” I did imply that it was more “quixotic” than following Salter’s prescriptions as outlined in his book.

Okay. Select a word that best describes your dismissive reaction to a proposition that we revive or simulate the selective conditions which make people more White. Would you not characterize your reaction as dismissive?

John and Mark are full brothers and are walking down the street. They meet a friend – a completely unrelated stranger – named Charles. They all notice that Charles and John look a lot more alike than does John and Mark. Is the actual kin relation between John and Mark less important than the surface resemblance between John and Charles?

One can’t merely confuse phenotype with “surface resemblance”. Phenotype includes personality, intelligence, strength, and so on. At the individual level, it includes features which are recessive in an individual specimen, but that becomes less of a factor at the group level.

Setting aside the debate about the merits of consanguinity, I would encourage my daughter to marry a Finnish or Slovenian immigrant who manifests to a greater degree the form being pursued than a cousin who did not. Do you see the critical difference there? By insisting on the function, one preserves the form better than if he were to directly insist on the form.

So Parrott cares only about a fraction of the genome that codes for physical appearance, and discounts all the rest. Why?

You accuse me of jumping to conclusions (which I was indeed guilty of in some cases), then join in with some of your own? I care only about the fraction of the genome which codes for physical appearance and behavior. As you know, much of our genetic code is “junk” and there’s much in even the most “pure” populations that falls short of the ideal if one relies on architectural principles instead of clinging to specific blueprints.

Why not consider ALL distinctive genes? Certainly, some are more important than others. Genes that influence their own replication could, in theory, be considered of higher value than others that merely carry information on kinship relations (important in and of itself I think).

The base instinct for perpetuating your own kind is a good and necessary instinct to exploit in pursuit of our goal. But we can’t confuse it with the goal, which is the promotion of the set of aesthetic and behavioral inclinations which create high culture, win wars, inspire wars with their beauty, and fuel innovation.

However, how can you sit back and decide that one set of genes are privileged over all, and all the rest are meaningless?

I can’t sit back and decide on a line-by-line analysis of the genes. Those genes which happen to make people White are ideal. By your logic, my goal should be to marry and procreate with a woman who looks like me as my pursuit of my EGI makes mere relatedness the ideal. That’s deeply problematic and ultimately directionless.

If we then decide that we need to consider all the genome, then we get back to EGI, and reject Parrott’s ideas.

If we decide that there are higher values than mere relatedness, then we see that EGI is of limited utility in providing prescriptions for preserving and promoting Whiteness.

Obviously gene frequencies change over time. This is natural. Salter’s EGI concept is more about preventing large negative impacts on genetic fitness – such as mass migration, or people thinking that South Asian Kalash are European if someone posts a picture of a couple of fair-headed Kalash children.

Salter’s EGI concept is solid. I’m not arguing against it. I’m arguing against premature attempts to borrow concepts from it to inform our politics. As I stated in my article, I support drawing the line at “European”. The difference is that I do so for political reasons and do not pretend to do so for biological reasons. The science relating to the relative “Whiteness” of these non-European Caucasians is in its infancy, but the clinal nature of it is too obvious to allow you to pretend it can ever be “empirically determined”.

I see. Parrott wants to recreate the conditions that “created Whiteness” – the conditions of tens of thousands of years ago – and he thinks that simply preventing race replacement migration is “quixotic?”

Yes. Herein lies the crux of the matter. You believe it’s laughable to attempt to construct a sociopolitical context which selects for Whiteness. In its place, you propose “eugenics” while having no idea what you’re even selecting for. Merely selecting for intelligence or success in the contemporary context will not select for the nature of intelligence and the behavioral inclinations which result in White societies.

To preserve and improve the form, one must understand the function. You don’t. You’re under the false impression that our features were selected tens of thousands of years ago primarily through environmental selection when we were selected much more recently and primarily through sexual selection. The difference here is pivotal, as an accurate appreciation of the origin of Whiteness leads one to conclude that recreating the condition is neither anachronistic nor laughable.

The difference between genotype and phenotype is a distinction without a difference. If an individual looks and acts White, then he’s White, regardless of how his genome arrived at that effect. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that similar selective conditions created Whiteness in relatively unrelated populations. If that is the case, then those populations would have been anthropologically White, if not necessarily our European kin. The Old European, Mediterranean/Semitic, Aryan, and Finno-Ugric populations comprising Europe may not be as related as they appear.

The distinction between genotype and phenotype is a distinction with a difference. I take it that you point, though, is that it is distinction that should not make a difference to us socially and politically: if a person looks and acts white and can meaningfully take part in a white society, then does it matter if nature took a slightly different pathway to arrive at someone who is phenotypically and behaviorally and functionally the same?

[I]f a person looks and acts white and can meaningfully take part in a white society, then does it matter if nature took a slightly different pathway to arrive at someone who is phenotypically and behaviorally and functionally the same?

The distinction between genotype and phenotype is a distinction with a difference. I take it that your point, though, is that it is distinction that should not make a difference to us socially and politically: if a person looks and acts white and can meaningfully take part in a white society, then does it matter if nature took a slightly different pathway to arrive at someone who is phenotypically and behaviorally and functionally the same?

Ignoring the unfortunate political factors involved here, this article does not set forth a coherent case for the anti-scientific, anti-biological, and anti-racial views of the metaphysical/mystical school of thought.

I am puzzled why such people, or at least the most extreme among them, associate themselves with the pro-white movement at all. Anti-biologism is inconsistent with white racial survival—as I’m sure its more perceptive proponents fully understand.

After all, you cannot preserve what you refuse to define because of ideological or philosophical convictions that preclude the necessary analysis.

Anti-scientific and anti-rational views explicitly hostile to racialism are inconsistent with racial preservation.

[T]his article does not set forth a coherent case for the anti-scientific, anti-biological, and anti-racial views of the metaphysical/mystical school of thought.

That’s fortunate, given that I was not promoting anti-scientific, anti-biological, and anti-racial views. In this particular case, Evola happened to be consistent with science, biology, and biological racialism. He was merely consistent with a more complete understanding of it than Sallis displayed. I reject the dichotomy between biology and mysticism, and believe a more complete understanding of one converges towards the other.

The biological study of race explains phenomena that are apparent to the naked eye. People knew the difference between different races, and were concerned with preserving the purity of their stock, long before the emergence of science. So in what sense does racial preservation actually depend on biology? Biology is surely helpful, but is it really the foundation of racial preservation?

If biology were the foundation of racial preservation efforts, then we would expect to find no racial preservation efforts before the rise of modern biology. Yet racial preservation through endogamy rules is a rather ancient practice. Ergo, scientific biology cannot a necessary condition of racial preservationism.

I have no strong sense from history that people instinctively understood the differences between races, or thought in essentially racial terms, prior to the emergence of science. Race is a quintessentially modern, scientific concept. It emerges with Linnaeus and Blumenbach.

The only consistent exception to this rule, perhaps, was whites’, and possibly others’, innate reaction to blacks. But even that could not withstand Jewish social pressure to destroy the barrier.

Jews are the paradigmatic example of people who often do not differ phenotypically from whites and are perceived by us as racially indistinguishable: “They look white to me.”

Races survived not because people were concerned with preserving the purity of their stock, but due to de facto geographic isolation and the absence of modern transportation.

In areas such as central and western Asia and India where numerous races came into contact, large-scale mixing routinely occurred.

A movement that denigrates or tosses scientific biology aside is shooting itself in the head, not the foot–unless, of course, it is centered upon other concerns. Why not simply remove race from the equation altogether and focus on the philosophical/religious elements deemed primary?

I am not talking about an instinct for maintaining racial separation, which does not seem to exist, but merely an awareness that there are differences. Whether people want to maintain them or not is another issue, and where they did wish to maintain them, they erected endogamy rules, segregation rules, etc. People did not need modern racial science or modern genetics to know that there are racial differences, that inter-racial mating produced hybrids, etc. So, again, just how foundational in modern race science to what White Nationalists really want?

An awareness of racial differences is simply a logical continuation of ethnocentrism; which is an inherent part of human nature. If ethnocentrism is a product of biology, then clearly it does not require Theories of biology to exist. Science may explain instincts but it does not create them and no one can plausibly argue that nationalism, racial or not in character is simply the result of a reasoned and objective response to the finding of the human sciences.

No. Biologism it is incompatible with racial survival. Any people that is reduced to defending its existence merely in terms of the natural science,s has lost any intuitive connection to either High Culture, Spirituality or Martial Values. It is a walking corpse and nothing but dead meat.
Fortunately we haven’t reached that stage yet and have Traditions and Symbols which The Race can rally round.

Let me be a little simplistic here. While it’s a great convenience if an opposing racial group in our midst wears a distinguishing uniform of skin colour, even if a racial opponent was externally identical with us he would still be a racial opponent.

If externals were all there was to it, there would be no trouble with negros. I’m with Sallis.

When I read well-reasoned, intelligent arguments such as this one, Matt, I wonder why do you believe that Covington is crazy? If the masses of whites are to reverse the yin, judaized Spirit of the age, shouldn’t a revival of the Aryan, violent Yang is to be expected? Present-day Christians no longer represent that spirit: Christianity has become judaized beyond recognition.

This is my prediction:

1)Pace Covington—in a recent podcast he said that the American fiscal crisis will be gradual—, the dollar is going to crash not gradually, but in an epochal week during this or the next presidency.

2) In the turbulent months following the crash the blacks will start behaving as they behaved in New Orleans after Katrina (cf. the O’Meara chapter on the subject in Toward the White Republic).

3) At last—after the missed chance during the Third Reich—a window of opportunity for revaluating all values will be opened in the West, the last chance in history, starting with the crashed US.

The rest I cannot predict. It depends on us. Like Frodo with his ring, we will have a chance before darkness descends forever. But as I’ve told you elsewhere, Aryan civilization depends on tough guys and even on thugs.

Yes, we will have the chance to revert to the Yang spirit after the crash, as in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance whosecity slicker, James Stewart, wasn’t up to the job. The town had to be saved by the violent, marginal brute, John Wayne.

Whenever you find such men hold on to them. Covington and Linder might inspire the tough guys that will make history, but they themselves represent the soft approach. The hard approach will only come after non-whites misbehave in a crashed America inciting a bloody revolutionary movement.

My point: The inner extinction Evola speaks of can only be overcome if we repudiate the Empire of the Yin and reclaim our Yang spirit: our right to use violence and, when the conditions arrive, actually using it. So why do you say that Covington is crazy?

I write this comment because it seems to me that you are stuck with the Jimmy Stewart types of the movement, and at the same time despise the John Waynes. (Is this a fair interpretation of your position?…)

My point: The inner extinction Evola speaks of can only be overcome if we repudiate the Empire of the Yin and reclaim our Yang spirit: our right to use violence and, when the conditions arrive, actually using it. So why do you say that Covington is crazy?

I write this comment because it seems to me that you are stuck with the Jimmy Stewart types of the movement, and at the same time despise the John Waynes. (Is this a fair interpretation of your position?…)

The only bad things I’ve said about Covington relate to my experience catching him sock puppeting then claiming everybody who caught him was a Cass Sunstein operative. I evidently take Linder seriously enough to actively engage him in discussions about strategy. Neither man is somebody I feel comfortable following, both for personal and tactical reasons. Though it has nothing to do with their being too “John Wayne” for me. I certainly don’t despise hard men for being hard and I certainly don’t have any special affection for lukewarm men and their schemes to sneak up on our enemies and defeat them at some sort of impartial debating contest.

I think that Matt’s problem basically boils down to the point that racial preservationism (which is what the EGI argument supports) is not enough to save us. But you agree with that point. So I think you are talking past one another. But coming to a nuanced position where miscommunication does not occur is a tricky and very important project. This exchange is a good enough place to start.

Precisely to what part of my last essay does Parrott have objections? Not generalities, not vagueness – specifics.

1. The difference between genotype and phenotype is a distinction without a difference. If an individual looks and acts White, then he’s White, regardless of how his genome arrived at that effect.

2. You believe it’s laughable to attempt to construct a sociopolitical context which selects for Whiteness. You’ve conceded defeat at the outset.

3. Attempting to arrive at an anthropological rather than a political definition of Whiteness is bad for business, as it invites both the sort of Kalash novelty silliness you warn against and the Nordicist v. Mediterranean infighting which undermines our unity.

After all, what if the science confirmed that those Kalash are more White than Sicilians? Would you expel the latter in favor of the former?

It lacks altogether a deeper appreciation of the nature of what those alleles actually represent.

And what do they represent? And why should Parrott’s personal opinion on what they represent trump the adaptive value of pursuing genetic interests?

In many ways, the past decade has been a lost one for our cause due to its inappropriate emphasis on arguments and strategies drawn from biological research.

The past decade has been lost mainly because “our cause” is predominantly populated by freaks, cranks, frauds, and the shockingly naive. Biology is hardly to blame for lack of progress.

It’s self-evidently obvious that nobody’s going to be compelled to die in battle for his “ethnic genetic interests,” at least not explicitly so.

People have, and will continue, to die for “blood and soil.” “Blood” is a metaphor for kinship, and “soil” for carrying capacity/territory.

This is perhaps fortunate, given that such a campaign wouldn’t accomplish the presumed objective.

Which is what?

Preservation in the conventional sense is futile, even if we Whites were to colonize Mars. In the final analysis, form is a reflection of function, and the White race has been in a steady decline since the selective factors which generated Whiteness subsided.

I support eugenics and cultural rebirth as much as anyone. What any of this has to do with distinguishing genotype from phenotype, I cannot fathom, unless some are still upset over the “racial cuckoldry” essays, and subsequent correspondence.

Is Whiteness defined as a collection of visible and invisible traits that can be quantified through genetic analysis, or is Whiteness a holistic effect of adaptation to a specific challenge?

Er…since the “visible and invisible traits” are in large part derived from selective pressures from “specific challenges,” I fail to see the incompatibility between the two.

The line drawn at the Strait of Bosphorus is a purely political line and shouldn’t be confused for an anthropological one.

This remains to be empirically determined.

It’s smart to draw the line there for historical, geographical, political, religious, and cultural reasons.

First Parrott says the division is “purely political.” Then he also promotes “historical” as well as “cultural” etc. reasons.

But there are plenty of specimens on the Asiatic side of the strait whose genotype and phenotype are essentially White, and there are plenty of specimens on the European side of the strait whose genotype and phenotype are generally incommensurate with any attempt to arrive at a common definition of what it means to be White. The squishy reality is that the genetic difference between White Europeans and Asiatic Caucasians is more clinal than cladistic.

This is all completely subjective. I’d take Salter’s science over Parrott’s subjectivity. This misses the point in that I’ve never argued that group identity is solely biological/genetic. My latest essay did not argue that either. It simply corrected Greg Johnson’s confusion of genotype and phenotype.

Would a purely “White” population which has radically transformed itself through resorting within its gene pool continue to be “White” as we know it, despite being completely different?

Obviously gene frequencies change over time. This is natural. Salter’s EGI concept is more about preventing large negative impacts on genetic fitness – such as mass migration, or people thinking that South Asian Kalash are European if someone posts a picture of a couple of fair-headed Kalash children.

To survive, we must discover a way to re-create or simulate the selective conditions which created Whiteness in the first place.

I see. Parrott wants to recreate the conditions that “created Whiteness” – the conditions of tens of thousands of years ago – and he thinks that simply preventing race replacement migration is “quixotic?”

It’s not about identifying some alleles and preserving them. Even if this quixotic project were completely successful, it would only succeed at arresting our potential for further progress.

It’s a pity that people allegedly on the “right” comment on EGI without having read Salter’s book. Salter understands that competition, evolution, and replacement of sub-optimal alleles should continue. No one argues for absolute allele frequency preservation.

Sallis arrives at prescriptions that are at best incomplete and at worst counter-productive.

And what prescriptions are these? There were no “prescriptions” in my latest piece. The point of that essay was simply to note that genetic interests and phenotypic interests are not the same and should not be confused. Further, I stated, as a fact of nature, that adaptiveness is favoring kin, so that preferences for non-kin over kin based on phenotype will likely be maladaptive. These are facts, not “prescriptions.” Do you know the difference?

If we expect to actually reverse the decline in the frequency of the alleles which are unique to our population, then we’ll have to look beyond alleles and towards the traditions and transcendent ideals which were once the function animating our biological form.

Please point out where I have ever argued against that. I’m the guy who wrote the “Overman High Culture” piece, remember? Parrott’s comment quoted here is essentially a major part of my actual “prescription,” as I’m as much a supporter of Yockey as I am of Salter.

we shouldn’t pretend that the men and women with freckles and cleft chins who land on the wrong side of it are genetically alien in any meaningful way.

Whether the men or women have “freckles and cleft chins” – what has that to do with being “genetically alien?’ One can find “coffee and cream” mulattoes with “freckles and cleft chins” – what’s the point? This latest quote demonstrates that Parrott completely missed the point of my latest essay. If you are going to ponder whether someone is or is not genetically alien, then, for goddsakes, look at their genes, not their “cleft chins.”